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The universe will reveal itself to any who seek its discovery. Until then, it will remain in the dark. One must shine their own heart light to discover them. Because they are in the dark doesn't mean it's a dark thing as in a bad or negative thing.

When we make these dicoveriess in physical form, we pull more light into matter. The idea is to get matter to house the light of spirit.

It couldn't just start out that way. The nervous system is to delicate and evolving. It takes time.

thats nonsense. You are inseparable from your personal history. Self importance should be done away with, yes, but removing personal history is like taking the engine out of a car so that it's lighter.

Spoiler: Don Juan doesnt stick with 'lose yourself' for very long. Once Carlos is centered and honest with himself he has to find personal value again to become a virtuous warrior.

Now, remember Don Juan doesnt feel he needs to tell the truth. He always says what his student needs to hear to 'progress'. At this point Carlos keeps getting fucked up because he is afraid of shit. One of the fears he has (and keeps for a long time) is of fucking up. Thats why DJ tells him not to worry about 'who he is' and worry about the way of the warrior. There is definitely a big difference between secrets and lies. I dont know exactly what your seeing as conflicting there, but I think I might know a section from one of those books that can help. In it Carlos is by himself and sees 3 people in a road. Then he goes back to Juan and he tells him he fucked up a golden opportunity. Ill try to find that part cause I cant really explain the significance without it. I think its in Ixlian so if you know the passage hit me up.

--------------------Gaia, as you awaken, I heal myself. As I awaken, you are healed.

The power plants given as a gift by another sorcerer? The three allies? Trying to retrive the gift of power, the lost opportunity?

Anyway DJ tricks Carlos all along the way and even warns him that he will trick him and he will fall for it. The purpose of these "lessons" is often to put him off the track of the most important things so he doesn't become obsessive and start indulging and slow everything down. That doesn't mean though that these things are nonsense.

I never knew personal history was like the engine of a car.

-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom.

" All that lives was born to die"-Anom.

With much wisdom comes much sorrow,
The more knowledge, the more grief.
Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC

Well, you're trying to understand the fictional words of a fictional character. Casteneda was a master story-teller and all of his books (except the last) were all about mystery. He may as well been writing about intriques on another planet as in the Sonoran desert. I read the whole series beginning in 1972 and even quoted some in my doctoral dissertation, but one can discern the threads that he so skillfully wove together from various occult sources, dovetailing the psychedelic 60's and vanguarding the occult revival of the early 70's. I was told by world renowned Egyptologist (and J.B. Rhine-taught parapsychologist) Bob Brier (TLC, The Learning Channel) back in 1974, shortly after he gathered with Casteneda and others at Harry Houdini's grave on Halloween '74 that "There IS no Don Juan."

Secrets are not necessarily lies. The word derives from the meaning 'separate' and can mean knowledge that is not appropriate for the uninitiated because harm might befall them or they might profane something sacred. I teach children to be drug free and I am serious about that. I would never tell 11, 12 or 13 year old children about the value of entheogens! They would not comprehend and they would come to all wrong conclusions. This knowledge is a secret from them, whereas a 25 year old seeker might be ripe for such knowledge

Quote:MJF said:....if you lose self-importance then why would you ever be compelled to lie?

I say if you lose self-importance then it wouldn't be such a big deal to lie. Like it's the ego that makes us feel bad about lying about our personal history. Why does it matter when and where you were born, and why do others need to know? I feel that losing personal history helps level the playing field and reduce our self-importance in that it doesn't matter what happened in the past, we are all here now living in the present.

--------------------"This whole idea that different is bad, that a change in consciousness is in itself harmful, is really one of the fundamental problems inherent in the drug war.” - Rick Doblin
my cactus collectionYou vote with your dollars. Everyday. Vote responsibly.

IMHO dj was talking about collective influences. Some say friends make eachother, and I agree to a degree. Losing ones personal history, means losing peoples preconceived or fixed views on oneself. If your in a tight group of friends without the others sharing your flow towards change, they will hold you back - on a metaphysical level. Or not. Also on a purely influential level of course, but there is more to it. Group consciousness is a very strong force.

Sometimes I can feel myself slipping into the pattern expected of me from the one or group I'm sharing the moment with. Or at least I can feel it's pull and push on me. Feel how they look at me. I've started playing clown more, this might help. When dull, I easily slip into it without ever noticing.

eta: the Joker ties in here. Be slippery, flowing and filling, avoid the fixed pattern.

Quote:LittleBen said:Spoiler: Don Juan doesnt stick with 'lose yourself' for very long. Once Carlos is centered and honest with himself he has to find personal value again to become a virtuous warrior.

Now, remember Don Juan doesnt feel he needs to tell the truth. He always says what his student needs to hear to 'progress'. At this point Carlos keeps getting fucked up because he is afraid of shit. One of the fears he has (and keeps for a long time) is of fucking up. Thats why DJ tells him not to worry about 'who he is' and worry about the way of the warrior. There is definitely a big difference between secrets and lies. I dont know exactly what your seeing as conflicting there, but I think I might know a section from one of those books that can help. In it Carlos is by himself and sees 3 people in a road. Then he goes back to Juan and he tells him he fucked up a golden opportunity. Ill try to find that part cause I cant really explain the significance without it. I think its in Ixlian so if you know the passage hit me up.

I will do you one better. There is not and never has been a Carlos Castaneda. He was just as much a fiction as Don Juan. The man who created Don Juan and Carlos Castaneda was, as best as can be figured, named Cesar Arana. You see Mr. Arana lost his personal history so thoroughly a proper biography has never been done due to it's difficulty in finding personal facts. He was a master at concealing his identity while presenting fictitious facts about himself. The character he portrayed himself as never existed. It should be no wonder that the rest of the books were fiction also. To assume they do not describe a valid teaching is incorrect. There are devices such as parable and metaphor that are often used in teaching ideas. To argue their factual truth is missing the forest(the philosophy) for the trees(the facts). The ideas represented in these books can be found across the spectrum of Native American philosophy. There are also many similarities between the ancient Mayan religious traditions and the ideas presented by "Castaneda". When the conquest of Central America started the holy men of that area were often forced to migrate north to avoid execution by the Spanish. Most of these people joined other tribes and integrated many of their philosophies into the religions of their adopted tribe. The medicine wheel is one such idea that migrated from Central America to the plains of America in this fashion. This is one reason why these teachings are not found elsewhere as a cohesive whole. To assume that these ideas were stolen from western occultists is merely ethnocentrism. You assume such primitive people could only have simple ideas.

--------------------"A warrior is a hunter. He calculates everything. That's control. Once his calculations are over, he acts. He lets go. That's abandon. A warrior is not a leaf at the mercy of the wind. No one can push him; no one can make him do things against himself or against his better judgment. A warrior is tuned to survive, and he survives in the best of all possible fashions." ― Carlos Castaneda

Without taking the time at this hour (even though hurricane Catrina has cancelled work for me tomorrow) to cross-reference things, I could illustrate pages from C.W. Leadbeater's little book The Astral Plane, and quote parts from the series Man, Myth and Magic that came out in 1972, that talks of entities that look like a pointed witch's hat to a clairvoyant, suspended in the air. This is how Don Juan describes an "ally" when it is "seen" through one's luminous egg body. I'm certain there are Toltec and MesoAmerican sources that I am not familiar with that enter into the writings. Also, I once had a conversation, via a translator, with Ayahuascaro Pablo Amaringo after a lecture on witchcraft and sorcery, and I seem to remember some similarities with Casteneda's stories. Regardless, the man, whoever he was, scammed a Ph.D. in anthropology from Columbia University and went on to make millions and develop a cult following. He was a trickster figure after all.

but now i'm thinking...does this mean that lying is only for personal gain? you could be lying to help a friend. but to have no self-importance i think would mean that you know that all beings and things are all equally important or non-important and you woulnd't need to lie for them either.

lies are deliberate obfuscation of what should be exposed, while secrets are complex facts that can be understood with persistence, they are only hidden in complexity.

one needs lots of personal integrity to deal with these ideas: occasionally for diplomacy one deliberately adds complexity to facts in order to hide them in the open, this takes tremendous skill and respect.